1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an air conditioning apparatus switching a blow mode by moving a flexible film member having opening portions to pass air and opposing each air outlet of an air conditioning case.
2. Description of Related Art
As shown in FIG. 6, an automotive air conditioning apparatus disclosed in Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open 4-257720 includes a blower 102, an evaporator 103 and a heater core 104 provided in order from an air upstream side of an air conditioning case 101. At an air downstream end of the air conditioning case 101, a face air outlet 105, a foot air outlet 106 and a defroster air outlet 107 are provided. The air outlets 105 through 107 communicate respectively with a face blow outlet, a foot blow outlet, a defroster blow outlet (not shown in Figure) formed inside an automotive passenger compartment. A blow mode switching door 108 made of a flexible film member is provided extendedly so as to face each of the above-described air outlets 105 through 107.
At the door 108, opening portions to pass air are formed. At both ends of the door 108, a driving shaft 109 and a driven shaft 110 are installed. By rotating the driving shaft 109 and the driven shaft 110 in clockwise and counterclockwise directions, the door 108 can move inside the air conditioning case 101.
Positional relations between the opening portions of the door 108 and each air outlet are shown in FIGS. 7A through 7E. A defroster mode is shown in FIG. 7A, a foot/defroster mode is in FIG. 7B, a foot mode is in FIG. 7C, a bi-level mode is in FIG. 7D and a face mode is in FIG. 7E.
Among various kinds of automobiles, an automotive air conditioner is designed to blow a small amount of leak air from the side face blow outlet in the foot mode. In order to blow a small amount of air from the side face blow outlet in the foot mode by using the door 108 in FIGS. 7A through 7E, a portion between a right end and a broken line in the face air outlet 105 as shown in FIG. 8 is formed as an air outlet communicating with the side face blow outlet. Moreover, the door 108 is provided at a position shown in FIG. 8.
In this case, the air amount blown off from the side face blow outlet is determined by an area in which an opening portion 111 of the door 108 opens the side face blow outlet, that is, a product of a width t1 multiplied by a width t2 in FIG. 8. As shown in FIG. 8, since the width t2 is equal to a width t3 in a vertical direction of an opening portion 112 opening a foot air outlet 106 (t2=t3), the width t2 is long enough, and therefore, to make a value of t1.times.t2 small, a value of the width t1 must be small.
Thus, providing that the width t1 is small and the width t2 is long, for example, when a desired stop position (a position in FIG. 8) of the door 108 happens to shift from an actual stop position of the door 108 for any reason, that is, when the value of width t1 is changed, the value of t1.times.t2 is changed largely. That is, the amount of leak air blown from the side face blow outlet is changed to a large degree from a desired amount.
The above described problem occurs generates whenever a certain amount of air is intentionally leaked from a certain blow outlet in certain blow mode.